


the wolf

by cirque



Category: Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms, The Boy Who Cried Wolf - Aesop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-03
Updated: 2020-02-03
Packaged: 2021-02-20 21:30:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22550032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cirque/pseuds/cirque
Summary: He was feral and uncompromising; the wolf would be proud, he thought.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	the wolf

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Scytale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scytale/gifts).



When he was but a boy, Anders met a wolf. He kept it secret, after the initial embarrassment of being caught in the lie, held it in the hollow of his chest where his heart used to be. He told no one, and eventually people stopped asking. He grew up, and he still lied.

The wolf was the usual type: grey, half-rabid, lost in the hills. There was something to be said for the glint of freedom in his eye. Anders remembered that most of all - his wild look of wonder, the tilt of his head as he looked him over, his assessing gaze. He had felt two-inches tall under that beast’s eyes, his throat going tight at the eye contact. He hated that feeling, but he longed to imitate it. The  _ power _ . He had feared the wolf, and envied him.

He grew up in much the usual way. People talked, as people do, and no one trusted him with anything, ever again. So he moved away, found new people to lie to, took a woman to wife and lost her within the year. When she died, he howled up into the night sky, releasing his grief into the dark.

He dabbled in magic after he lost her. There was a hunger in his bones that leant itself to magic. He had long felt  _ different _ , marked from his peers, so magic seemed to be the next logical step. He wanted desperately to bring his wife back. He gathered crystals, drank of vile potions, worshipped the woods god and the earth mother and other nameless gods besides. He poured over spell books, day and night, falling into a fitful sleep. He dreamt of the wolf, his silvery eyes, the stench of muck on his raggy coat.

He had long been proficient in lies, fluent in the language of weaving a falsehood embellished with just enough truth. Lying came naturally to him, always had. He employed his lies to his own benefit, drinking in gossip and using it to manipulate the various villagers that he set his sights on. So-and-so had been cheating on his wife, somebody had stolen from the baker’s oven, someone else was wishing desperately for the death of their mother in law. He tricked them all with his knowledge of their secrets, and they bought his silence with gold. He made a pretty fortune that way. He was feral and uncompromising; the wolf would be proud, he thought. 

None of it brought his wife back, of course, in fact he grew more and more accustomed to the idea that she was gone forever. In all his new religious leanings, his conversations with the spirits, his dabblings in necromancy - all had taught him that she was never coming back. Death was permanent, like the stain of a lie that followed you from town to town.

He moved again, started a new life. Met a new woman and gave her children. Bought her a house and as much jewelry as she could wear. He still lied, for some things could never be left behind. He stood outside in their little vegetable plot and looked up into the hills. He yearned for the wolf he knew was lurking there, for the majesty of it. 

He felt its eyes on him, that unique feeling of a creeping up his spine. He could almost smell its bloody breath, amid the fragrant mint growing there. It made him feel sick but still he waited.

“Find me,” he said to the wilderness. The trees brushed against each other, singing in the wind. The frogs croaked out. Then, everything was still. Anders found himself praying to the wolf now. “Find me,” he said, forsaking other gods. “I have missed you.”

He thought of his son, not three years old, asleep in the shared bedroom. Did he really want to invite the wolf in, so close to his family? “Yes,” he called out into the dark, “Come visit. Come see me. I am waiting.”

The bushes parted and out trotted the wolf, as easy as anything, as easy as lying. Its eyes were moonlike and beautiful, a terror and a warning and a lure all at once. Its mouth was parted, hot breath fogging up before it. It growled, and it was like everything he remembered. He stepped down and walked through the vegetables, his hands spread and open, right there among the stunted carrots. He gave himself up into the night. He looked at the wolf and he felt complete. He felt as though this was the truest thing in his life, and he reached up to take a twirl of its fur about his fingers. 

The wolf turned towards him, and it was no friend.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know...


End file.
